Like Him
by KonohasBlackReaper
Summary: Sequel to LIKE ME! Must read before this fic. After the encounter with Orochimaru, Sakura can't help but wonder.


**I had never expected Like Me to become so popular. It was just a result of an idea I got from another fic I had read. But the response it got was really humbling.**

 **A lot of readers wanted some sort of continuation but I always hesitated because the beauty of the fic was that it left Naruto's character to the Reader's choice. Putting a definite to it would ruin half the fun.**

 **I was sitting in my room when I decided to just type down an idea I had for something that COULD have happened after Like Me. I hadn't intended to post it unless i thought it wouldn't ruin Like me for half the readers.**

 **So this is my little attempt to maybe do a sequel. But the tragedy with Sequels is that most of them fail to even reach the First story.**

 **I hope this is not one of them. If it is, I'll most likely delete it.**

 **Still, read and let me know.**

 **P.S - it's my birthday today [14 july] , so leave me lots of reviews as gifts. :-D**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

" _Kukuku… little children, you forget. I, too wanted to be Hokage."_

"…a-cha…."

 _"On that day, we will all know if he is like the image you have of him in your minds, or after all, He is Like Me."_

"…kura-chan!"

Sakura's head jerked up and her eyes widened in surprise.

"Sakura-chan! I've been calling out to you for so long –ttebayo!" a whiskered face entered her vision, brightening up the room with his million watt smile and sunshine hair.

"N-Naruto?" Sakura's heart was beating too fast for her liking. She had gotten immersed in her thoughts again, thoughts that made her feel guilty for even thinking.

"Of course it's me." The blonde postured. "Didn't you hear me calling?" he grinned down at her. "You're already losing your hearing, are you?" he sniggered. "Getting old, huh-ttebayo? Soon you'll be getting wrinkles."

All her guilt faded as a vein popped out on her forehead "NARUTO YOU IDIOT!" she screeched and punched him into the sky.

A while later, she sat fuming on a street bench as Naruto sat kneeling in front of her and bowing, face swollen and hands joined together above his head in apology. "Solly Sakula-than!" he lisped from between his large lips.

"And?" she asked, turning an eye towards him.

"You al the plettieth kunoiti in da billage." He answered obediently.

"Never you forget it." she harrumphed at him. Then she grinned and pulled him into the chair next to him. She felt a lot lighter as she healed her idiotic teammate. Not just because her feminine rage had been sated. _'Orochimaru knows nothing."_ She smiled. _'How can anyone so sweet and innocent be anything like Him?'_ she looked at the grinning blonde as her green hands passed over his face and healing him, she shook her head mentally. _'Sure he pranks people, and maybe he gets carried away sometimes,'_ she thought of the examples Orochimaru had given and a few more she had looked up after returning from that fateful mission. _'but it has always been unjustly provoked from him.'_

Sitting here with him brought a relief to her and ended the war inside her that had been raging for a while now.

Sakura had been affected deeply by Orochimaru's words and she knew some of her other friends had been too. They had always taken Naruto for granted, taken Naruto's odd antics for granted. Had his actions really hidden a darkness behind them? Did he know or was it instinctual? Was he fooling all of them? Did he even think what he was doing was wrong or to him it was just petty revenge?

So many questions and no answers.

As she paid attention, she realized that despite the fact that Naruto never shut up, Naruto never actually _talked_.

She had tried to list out everything she knew about the blonde.

He was an orphan. [She knew it because it had been common knowledge in the academy.]

His favorite food was Ramen. [He sure ate bucketful's of the stuff]

His favorite person was Iruka. [The Sandaime was dead and who else was there anyways?]

He had a crush on Sakura [Did he really?]

His dream was to be Hokage. [ It was more than a dream, in her opinion. It was an almost an obsession]

He had the Kyuubi sealed in him. [He hadn't told her about it. She had snooped around and found it so she wasn't sure if it counted]

.

..

….

…

…..

And that was it.

That was all she knew about him.

They were teammates and that was all she knew about him. She knew more about the nurses in the Hospital for Kami's sake.

All these thoughts had troubled her and made her _think_ about what the Traitor had said and she loathed herself for it.

"What happened here?" a bored voice asked.

Sakura and Naruto looked up as familiar faces walked up to them.

"Yo Shika!" Naruto grinned, able to enunciate properly now.

"Getting beaten up again?" Ino smirked at him.

"It's Sakura-chan." Naruto said as if it explained everything. He then whispered. "She's crazy."

Sakura's grip on his injured chin tightened and he started sweating. "Is that so?" she asked sweetly and he shook his head. She playfully swatted him away and he bounced away towards the members of team Ten.

Ino chuckled, "Scared of your teammate?" she teased.

"Do you not know Sakura-chan?" he asked, eyes closed to slits and grinning like an idiot.

Sakura harrumphed and crossed her arms.

"How will you be Hokage if you're scared of your subordinates?" Ino picked on him further, hoping to tease Sakura through his replies.

"Because I'm awesome." Naruto said with confidence.

"That is not all that makes a Hokage, idiot." Sakura shot back at him. "Diplomacy, current affairs, politics." She shook her head. "So much goes into becoming Hokage."

Ino looked mischievously from the blonde to the pinklette. "Looks like Sakura is better trained to be Hokage."

Naruto looked surprised before he guffawed loudly, clutching his stomach.

"Hey!" Sakura glared at her teammate, a vein throbbing on her fore head. "It's nothing to laugh about, you know."

"Y-y-yeah, sure S-Sakura-chan." Naruto managed between guffaws.

"I'm serious." Sakura growled before smirking at her teammate. She closed her eyes, jutted her hip out haughtily and raised her hand in front of her. "I _am_ the Hokage's apprentice, you know. Who better to succeed Tsunade-sama than someone who learnt under her?" she asked.

As she postured in front of her friends, something tingled on the edge of her consciousness. She couldn't place it until she opened her eyes and looked around her.

There was no grumbling.

Instead of grumbling or making faces or protesting or even laughing, Naruto was silent.

Sakura turned to him and saw that he was just looking at her. Like he was seeing her for the first time. Like he had just realized something.

There was no furrow on his brow. There was no twitch of his lips.

No crinkle around his eyes. No laugh in his eyes.

No _warmth_ in his blue eyes.

Then he grinned and pointed comically at her. "Like hell I'd lose to anyone. Even Sakura-chan." He proclaimed loudly. "I'm going to go train and become even more awesome." He laughed maniacally like a villain of a slapstick comedy and darted off towards the training fields, the villagers shaking their heads and muttering under their breath at his idiotic behavior.

Sakura released a breath she hadn't known she was holding. Her eyes were wider than normal and were looking towards where Naruto had run off to. As he disappeared into the distance, Sakura could feel _something_ else disappear too. She couldn't identify what though.

Shikamaru was also looking in the same direction, his eyes narrowed. "Troublesome." He muttered before looking at Ino. "Why'd you have to go and say all that Ino?"

"Me?" the blonde girl was oblivious to Sakura's demeanor. "I was just teasing him. Besides," the girl flicked her pretty head to the side. "it's just Naruto."

"Troublesome." Shikamaru muttered as a breeze brushed past them, far colder than the weather should have allowed it to be.

* * *

The unsettling feeling was back again. Like something was missing. But once again, for the life of her, Sakura couldn't identify what it was.

Sakura didn't look up from healing Kiba as the boy went on about something or the other. On the opposite bed, Shizune was putting a few healing touches to Sakura's teammate, lightly scolding him. Usually, Sakura would have joined in, but she couldn't this day.

When the feeling became too much, her eyes flicked up towards Naruto but his eyes were at his own scratches while he nodded in tune to Shizune's words.

Swallowing, Sakura went back to healing the Inuzuka. The feeling did not go away even after Naruto left, but it lessened.

"Say Sakura." Shizune called her attention as they made their rounds. "Did Naruto do something stupid again?"

"Huh?" Sakura looked up too quickly. "Why would you ask that sempai?"

"You didn't give a him a talking to." Shizune said, unaware of the discomfort her fellow medic was going into.

"Oh." Sakura said. "I was just concentrating on Kiba." She smiled. "Besides, you were doing pretty well by yourself."

Shizune blushed. "I – I wasn't too hard on him, was I?"

"No, you weren't." Sakura shook her head and grinned.

"Well that's good to know." Shizune looked relieved as they approached the end of the ward. "But you know, I was asking because.." She looked a bit wonderingly at the ceiling, a finger on her chin, "Naruto was looking pretty intensely at you most of the time too. So I thought maybe you were mad at him and he was trying to figure out how to apologize." Shizune brightened. "But if everything's alright, Maybe I was just reading too much into it." she waved a goodbye to Sakura and walked away, leaving the pink haired medic frozen in her spot.

* * *

It was almost a week later when both members of Team seven met each other.

"H-hello Naruto." Sakura smiled at the blonde and the boy grinned right back.

"Yo Sakura-chan!" the blonde waved back at her, eyes crinkled shut and grin as wide as it ever was, a bounce in his step like always. "You got called for a mission too?"

"Yeah." Sakura nodded, trying to relax as Naruto appeared to have become normal. There was no tightness around her instincts. The boy's aura was as warm as it had been before Ino and she had run their mouth without thinking. They fell in step with each other, and by the time they reached Tsunade's office, Sakura was ready to forget the past week as flights of fancy on her part.

Almost.

But there was still something missing.

"Yo Baa-chan!" Naruto greeted the Hokage and a flying book greeted his nose.

"How many times have I called you not to call me that, you brat?" Tsunade screeched from her seat, her hand in the throwing position it had ended up after throwing the book at her pseudo-brother/grandson.

"You're not just a Granny, but grumpy Granny." The boy yelled back, holding a bleeding nose.

"You called, Shishou?" Sakura intervened before furniture started flying.

"Yes." Tsunade leaned back in her chair. "Intelligence has come in that some sensitive information is being smuggled out fire country to Iwa." She frowned. "It can't be allowed to happen. I am assigning team Kakashi to foil this transfer."

"Alright, a mission." Naruto cheered before looking around. "Where's Kakashi-sensei?"

"He isn't coming." Tsunade said.

"What?" Naruto and Sakura asked.

"I say Team Kakashi, but I mean you two." Tsunade smiled at them. "You both have shown yourselves capable enough for the mission."

"Solo mission." There were stars in Naruto's eyes, "My first Solo mission."

"And what am I? Chopped Liver?" Sakura growled at him and the blonde quickly backpedaled. "N-No Sakura-chan. I just meant our first mission without a jounin."

"Hmmph." Sakura appeared to be pacified and Naruto sighed with relief.

"Well then," Tsunade continued. "Sakura will be team leader."

Sakura's stomach dropped. For a second there, she had felt it. The same feeling she had felt off and on for the past week. The feeling that she could never confirm but was sure came when Naruto looked at her like he had looked at her with Ino and Shikamaru.

She turned her head to look at Naruto who was not looking at her but was pouting. "What? No fair. Why Sakura-chan?"

"Because she is the only responsible on between the both of you." Tsunade's eyebrow twitched at the boy's complaining. "You are too immature for command brat." Tsunade smiled teasingly, "Besides, she's my apprentice, you know. Teacher's pride and what not."

"Sure, sure." Naruto grumbled but when he passed a quiet Sakura, the hair on her neck stood straight.

"Let's go then, _Taicho."_ Naruto grinned at her from the door, looking genuinely happy for her, but all Sakura could think was - _Had his canines always been fangs?_

* * *

The mission had gone bad right from the start. They weren't apprehending just a mole. They had run into the Iwa team that was to receive the intel – a squad of five chuunin.

In the battle that ensued, Naruto had pulled three of them away from her and two of her opponents. The fight was a bit difficult as somehow, the stronger opponents had chosen her as an opponents. Still, she was not the Godaime's apprentice for nothing, despite what that traitorous Sannin had said.

"SHANNARO!" she cracked the ground open yet again, sending her opponents scrambling.

"Cha!" she growled as they tried to pincer her. "Like that will WORK!" she yelled and punched the ninja in the gut.

Her eyes widened as her victim turned to mud.

 _When did he -?_

It was only the instinct developed by dodging Tsunade's hellish boulder attacks that kept her alive.

Dodging by a hair's breadth, she cartwheeled back. To her dismay, it pushed her away from the courier bag she had been protecting. In a flash, the ninja grabbed it a fled.

"No!" Sakura leapt after them. Her instincts blared and swiveled sharply, a kunai in hand as a figure descended towards her. The sun was at the figure's back and all she could see was a tall figure. She thrust out her kunai but gasped as her hand was grabbed in a flash and _twisted_.

Unwillingly, her palm opened and her kunai fell from her grip before it was grabbed by the figure. Her attacker put his forearm on her back and pulled her arm behind her. She slammed into the ground, her attacker's knee on her spine, holding her down. She struggled but it was futile. Heart in her mouth and adrenaline pumping furiously, she tried to turn her neck to look at her opponent.

A familiar looking sandal was resting inches from her face, a hint of orange on the corner of her sight.

"Naruto?" she blurted out.

It was a second later that the weight was lifted from her and she turned quickly, still prone on the ground.

The sun was still behind him but the ninja gear told her it was her teammate. He towered over her, her kunai in hand, his face hidden by the sun's glare.

"Naruto?" Sakura hated how scared her voice was. She hadn't even let Orochimaru hear her like this.

Naruto squatted in front of her. "Man Sakura-chan. You almost killed me." He pouted.

Sakura's eyes widened. She wanted to strangle him but her body wasn't listening to her. "I almost killed you?" she asked. "What the hell were you doing, coming at me like that?"

"Come at you?" the blonde made a confused face. "Sakura-chan, I was just coming to your side. I wasn't coming at you."

"My instincts –"

"were wrong." Naruto said with so much conviction that Sakura believed him. Almost.

"I saw you go after them, I decided to help you." Naruto looked at her and held out a hand to her. "The next thing I know, you're trying to gut me."

"I – I.." Sakura looked at the hand and then at the wide, innocent eyes of the blonde. "I'm sorry." She said, her heart still hammering. She took his hand and stood up. She looked down at his other hand where he still held her kunai in the textbook perfect position.

' _All you need is a small jerk'_ she remembered their academy teacher saying. ' _to stab your enemy through the heart like this.'_

The blonde's eyes followed her gaze and she looked up. His eyes also moved to her and their gazes met. He grinned wide.

"Here." He held out the kunai to her that she accepted. He looked towards where the Iwa nin had now disappeared. "They got away."

* * *

"What do you mean they got away with the intel?" Tsunade's voice was a whiplash and Sakura winced. Naruto stood silently next to her as Tsunade ranted and raged.

"Maybe I was mistaken." Tsunade pinched the bridge of her nose. "You weren't ready for command."

"Shishou . . " Sakura looked up but Tsunade cut her off with a hand. The Hokage sighed. "You two are excused." She glared at them. "I need to do damage control."

Sakura bowed her head again, eyes stinging. "I'm sorry Shishou." She said before walking out of the office. Naruto followed her. As did the feeling that something was missing.

"Don't be sad, Sakura-chan." He said from her side. "Seeing you sad makes me sad."

She glanced at him from the side and he did indeed look like a kicked puppy.

"It was my fault." He said morosely. "I made you react, which made me react and the Iwa nin got away in that confusion."

Looking at him, Sakura could _feel_ the self-incrimination and guilt flowing from him.

Was this the same boy she had, for one terrifying moment, thought was going to kill her, back in the forest?

Or was he the boy who was beating himself up over her sadness?

Which was the truth and which was the lie?

' _A true shinobi.'_ Orochimaru had called Naruto on that fateful day and it was fitting. Even Sakura, his teammate, could not be sure at the moment.

Had her paranoia been just that – paranoia? Was she reading too much into something that was not really there? Was Orochimaru's words playing tricks on her mind?

Or was she finally seeing the truth of Naruto, when she had entered his cross hairs as a genuine threat for the first time in their life?

Which was the truth and which was the lie?

Sakura did not know.

But she did know something. She could not live like this.

"Naruto." She stopped and grabbed his hand.

"Yeah, Sakura-chan?" He returned her solemn gaze.

"Y-You know that, back on that day, Ino and I were joking, right?" Sakura rushed out.

"Huh?" he asked – and did the light die out from his eyes for a moment? – no, it was the trick of the light. Wasn't it?

The clouds had shifted a little and covered the sun. Right?

"I can't be the Hokage, Naruto." She pressed on. "I'm not awesome enough." She gave a forced smile.

Naruto grinned. "What are you talking about, Sakura-chan?" he grabbed her hand and raised it to his whiskered cheek. "You're kickass."

He looked like he meant it. He did, didn't he? Didn't he?

"But not kickass enough to be Hokage." She said and looked into his eyes. "Remember that." She said, with barely a hint of desperation. She smiled and this time, it was not forced. "You will be the Hokage. There is no one else I will accept."

And just like that, he grinned and the cloudy day turned sunny. "You mean that Sakura-chan?"

"Yes." She nodded. "Promise of a lifetime." She repeated his words that he had given her many years ago at the village gates.

"Thanks." His eyes shone as he hugged her and the warmth from his hug, his aura and his chest made her feel safe. She realized with a start that it was the feeling that had been missing for a while.

The feeling of being protected and loved by Naruto.

And it all became clear to her.

"Come." Naruto moved back and extended his hand. "I'll walk you home."

As Sakura took his hand, she heard a distant memory in her mind.

' _On that day, we will all know if he is like the image you have of him in your minds, or after all, He is Like Me.'_

' _I already know'_ she took his hand with nary a shake.

* * *

 **I pulled an 'Inception' on you guys :-D X-D**

 **At least I hope I did.**

 **What did Sakura mean at the end? That is a question I leave to you guys.**

 **Was it her doubt making her miss the feeling or was it really missing?**

 **There have been plenty of instances for both answers.**

 **Let me know what you think of this sequel..**


End file.
